🔗 Share this article

Mali has temporarily halted educational facilities and universities throughout the country due to a critical fuel scarcity resulting from a restriction on energy resources implemented by militant groups.

The Education Minister declared on state television that all education institutions would remain closed until November 9th, noting that the transportation of personnel and students had been impacted by the restrictions.

He stated that the government officials were “making every effort” to alleviate the emergency so that educational activities could restart on the tenth of November.

For a number of weeks, the nation has been facing a petrol crisis, particularly in the capital Bamako, after insurgents from an al-Qaeda-linked organization enforced a restriction by attacking fuel trucks on major highways.

The country is surrounded by land, so all fuel supplies are transported by road from bordering countries such as Senegal and the neighboring nation.

Long queues have been snaking around fuel outlets in the main city in the last several days, and the city's typically busy streets have now allegedly fallen quiet.

The junta-led administration had in recent days reassured residents that it was only a passing concern, but the situation has continued.

Last week, the American diplomatic mission in Bamako declared that non-critical embassy personnel and their families would evacuate Mali amid the worsening energy crisis and increasing protection worries.

It explained that the energy interruptions had disrupted the power distribution and had the “ability to disturb” the general safety conditions in unpredictable ways.

Mali is presently governed by a military junta headed by Gen Assimi Goïta, who seized power in a military overthrow in 2021.

The ruling council had widespread approval when it assumed control, committing to deal with the protracted safety emergency caused by a separatist rebellion in the north by ethnic Tuaregs, which was then taken over by Islamist militants.

The international UN troops and French forces had been stationed in previously to deal with the increasing militant activity.

Both have withdrawn since the military assumed power, and the ruling council has employed foreign fighters to tackle the instability.

Nonetheless, the jihadist insurgency has continued and significant areas of the northern and eastern zones of the nation remain beyond state authority.